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What New England Patriots’ Bill Belichick said about the ‘great’ Miami Dolphins

New England coach Bill Belichick spoke with the South Florida media Wednesday morning in advance of Monday night’s game against the Dolphins.

Here’s what he had to say:

On the absence of TE Rob Gronkowski, who is suspended for this game: “Well, we’ll just do what we always do — take the players that we have available and match them up against the great team that Miami has, their defense and how difficult they are to play against and block and move the ball — and try to come up with the best plan that we can to be competitive with them Monday night.”

On Dolphins RB Kenyan Drake’s 120 yards vs. Denver, including a 42-yard TD: “I thought Drake did a great job for them. He showed a lot of patience on that touchdown run, and we know he’s a very fast and explosive player. (Damien) Williams is a good player, too, and they both are very good in the passing game. They can both make plays in space, they’re hard to tackle, they’re both very dynamic players. So, it was just more of Drake, obviously, last week, but if Williams plays, he has the same kind of skill. They utilized both players against us in the first game, and we have a lot of respect for both of them. They’re both good players.”

On Dolphins TE Julius Thomas: “Well, I think Julius is a very talented player. He’s a hard guy to defend in the passing game. He’s long, he’s fast, he’s very athletic. They split him out and they keep him in tight. He’s good on deep routes and he’s good on intermediate routes and he’s tough after the catch. So, that will be a big challenge for us. I mean, they have great skill players with their receivers, their tight ends and their backs and, obviously, the quarterbacks. They have two good quarterbacks. So, a lot of good skill players on the field, and they’re all difficult to deal with. But, Thomas is an excellent player that, as I said, can attack you at all three levels of the defense, and we’re going to have to do a good job on him.”

On Tom Brady, playing so well at age 40: “Tom works hard and I think Tom’s talked a lot about that and discussed his personal training methods and so forth. So, I mean, he’s probably a better person to comment on that than I am, but Tom works hard, he’s here every day and puts an awful lot into his preparation, both physically and mentally for the game. So, I think that has a lot to do with it.”